9:48 p.m. — Haven’t ever seen anything like this. Just from watching on TV, it was a concert, a music video, a party. It was a rush. And the pure swagger shown by LeBron, Wade and Bosh was like that of the 1980s Hurricanes. They were rock stars, plain and simple. As J.A. Adande said on the ESPN2 telecast, “They better win the title.” Right now, on July 9, they think they can win the next seven. — Matt Porter

9:28 p.m. — Sources confirmed that Heat power forward Udonis Haslem will remain with the team. The same source also said that contracts for James, Wade and Bosh have already been signed. — Tom D’Angelo

9:26 p.m. — LeBron is asked how many championships the Heat can win. “Not one, not two, not three, not four” he begins, counting all the way up to seven, before saying he really believes it. “I’m not about blowing smoke,” he says. “I’m about business.”

9:23 p.m. — Bosh seems to be having the most fun of all the Big Three. Prompted to say a few words in Spanish, Bosh grins and says “Hola . . . Me llamo Chris . . . Yo estoy muy bien. Muy bien!” Best part of the exchange was the incredulous look on LeBron’s face as Bosh spoke. All three broke up laughing.

9:17 p.m. — “We’re gonna make the world know that the Heat is back,” LeBron tells the house.

9:03 p.m. — TV coverage of the Heat’s welcome party, which still has yet to introduce the players, has been preempted by the Marlins’ pregame show. Surprising that FOX Sports Florida couldn’t work it out, but here we are. Click the link above to view the live stream. ESPN2 is also showing it live, for now. — Matt Porter

8:50 p.m. — The hold-up is believed to be because all three are finalizing their deals. All three will get maximum contracts. Bosh and James will be involved in sign-and-trade deals for draft picks, giving all three players the maxium deal of $128 million, according to the Sun Sentinel. — Tom D’Angelo

8:40 p.m. — As of 8:30 p.m., the Big Three had not appeared yet.

Heat dancers came out to Glenn Frey’s The Heat Is On. The arena’s lower levels were occupied but not full. The upper levels had people six rows deep. Strobe lights spanned all over place. One sign from a fan read “3 Kings.”

DJ Irie screamed “Go crazy, Miami!”

Cori Saetae of Kendall said I’m here “to celebrate a new beginning. It’s going to be crazy.

“I’m not a big LeBron James fan. I’m glad Wade came back, LeBron is icing on the cake. This is Dwayne Qade’s masterpiece. If not for him, this wouldn’t happen. He masterminded this, not Pat Riley.” — Hal Habib

Fans wait to get into the party at AAA. (AP)

8:00 p.m. — At about 10 minutes to 8 p.m., people were still filing into AmericanAirlines Arena expecting to hear from the Heat’s Big Three – LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh – together for the first time in public since all three announced their intentions to sign free-agent contracts with Miami.

With a DJ spinning records and a smoke machine belching clouds, video highlights of the players were shown on the Arena scoreboard.

With the stadium about half-filled – with more still filing in – the atmosphere was loud and antsy as people held signs with photos of the Big Three and a message that read “Yes We Did.” — Hal Habib

There’s a championship for the Miami Heat to chase again, now that James and Chris Bosh have decided to play with him for years to come. And Wade already is counting down the days.

“It’s still surreal, man,” Wade said. “Me, Chris and ‘Bron. We ready. We want to go to the gym now.”

Wade, James and Bosh were together in their new home building for the first time Friday, as the Heat braced for 13,000 fans to arrive for a hastily called welcome party. Fans were given posters with James, Wade and Bosh together in Heat uniforms — “Yes. We. Did.” was the slogan in big white letters — and crowded around a runway surrounded by video screens and smoke effects.

If Heat president Pat Riley gets his way, it’ll be the first of many for the NBA’s newest star cluster — a grouping everyone, even Wade, is still getting used to.

“When I look around and see No. 6 and No. 1 on the court with me, that’s when it’s going to see real,” he said.

Until now, No. 6 meant Mario Chalmers, No. 1 meant Dorell Wright.

Chalmers will be back (wearing No. 15, his college number, probably) and Wright still could return, but going forward those digits belong to others.

(AP)

James will wear No. 6 instead of his usual 23. Bosh will don No. 1 instead of No. 4, Wade said, because he “wanted a new beginning.”

And even Wade — who considers his No. 3 sacred — thought about switching his number as well.

“Then I realized, three is magical, and now it represents more than just my number,” Wade said. “It represents the three of us making sacrifices as well.”

The jersey numbers aren’t all that important.

They just want the winning to be easy as 1-2-3.

Wade and Bosh decided Tuesday that they would play together in Miami, releasing that information to the world on Wednesday. With that, it was all up to James, who said he decided Thursday morning — hours before his made-for-TV announcement special that night — that he’d join the Heat and form a power triple.

Turns out, some members of the Heat family had more than an inkling that James was coming long before that show.

“I knew this was going to evolve a while ago,” Heat executive Alonzo Mourning said Friday. “We knew a long time ago. We did our due diligence on our recruiting trip, and we had a good feeling about this. When we came back, we knew that it pretty much was going to evolve in our favor.”

The end result?

Miami landed three of the top nine scorers in the league last season, the two-time reigning MVP in James, kept their own superstar (who said he wouldn’t have stayed if either Bosh or James hadn’t come to Miami) and gave fans reason to hope that the franchise’s wild pendulum — NBA’s best in 2006, NBA’s worst in 2008 — is clearly on a decided upswing.

“It’s going to take all of us to do it,” Wade said.

In Miami, the scene was sheer bliss on Friday.

James’ jerseys weren’t even going on hangers inside the Miami team store; for the most part, they were getting sold as soon as they could be taken out of the box. A line of fans snaked around the arena on a steamy morning just to put their names on a waiting list for tickets. The switchboard at AmericanAirlines Arena was overwhelmed for much of the day, and the 13,000 free seats for the welcoming bash were made available online at 4 p.m. — and were gone in an hour.